by Joachim B. Schmidt (T. Jamie Lee Searle)
SYNOPSIS
Kalmann is back! But he's already in trouble; in an interrogation room at the FBI headquarters in Washington, no less. All he wanted to do was visit his American father, but the loveable sheriff of Raufarhofn got himself mixed up in the January 2021 Capitol riots. Thanks to sympathetic FBI agent Dakota Leen, he's soon on a plane home. But not before she informs him that his grandfather was on a blacklist, suspected of spying for the Russians during the Cold War. Back in Iceland, there's a murder and one heck of a mystery to unravel. And what role does a mysterious mountain play in all this? Somehow Kalmann never loses heart. There's no need to worry; he has everything under control.
REVIEW
A trip to America to visit his father takes a turn when Kalmann ends up separated from his family and somehow gets inadvertently involved in the Capital Hill riots! After being picked up by the police for questioning, Kalmann, as expected, begins to tell them every single detail and luckily befriends a sympathetic FBI officer who realises that he is completely harmless. However, before heading back to Iceland, he finds out that his Grandfather was a Russian spy and placed on a blacklist. Cue Kalmann deciding to investigate whether his Grandfather was actually murdered rather than dying of natural causes as he had previously believed.
In creating the fabulous character of Kalmann, Joachim B. Schmidt has done for Icelandic Crime Fiction what Antti Tuomainen has done for Finnish Crime Fiction with his beloved character Henri Koskinen. He has created a character who transcends genres and will attract a wider audience of readers and persuade people who perhaps wouldn't usually choose a crime novel to give them a go, while at the same time showing that crime fiction (Icelandic crime fiction in particular) can also be humorous and fun as well as dark and brutal.
Kalmann and the Sleeping Mountain is a comic and fun thriller with just the right mix of Icelandic Noir and heartwarming escapades. Set against a backdrop of quite significant historical events, we get to navigate the world through the eyes of a young man who views things very differently to other people. What we might see as an absurd way to tackle a problem makes complete sense to Kalmann and he doesn't let other peoples opinions affect him or let them change the way he wants to do something - after all, he is the Sheriff of Raufarhõrn!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR & TRANSLATOR
Joachim B. Schmidt was born in 1981 and emigrated from Switzerland to
Iceland in 2007. He is the author of several novels and short stories and a
journalist and columnist. Joachim, who is Swiss and Icelandic, lives in Reykjavik
with his wife and their two children.
Jamie Lee Searle is a well-known translator from German and Portuguese into English. She has translated novels by Urs Faes, Anna Kim, Marc-Uwe Kling, Christoph Ribbat and the first Kalmann of course. She lives in Winchester in the UK.
Thanks to Anne Cater - @RandomTTours, Joachim B. Schmidt @JoachimB5chmidt and Bitter Lemon Press - @bitterlemonpress for the opportunity to read and review.
Fiction: Crime Fiction / Translated Crime Fiction
Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press
ISBN: 978-1916725003
Pages: 288pp
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